


The Hexen Identity

by shadowolfhunter



Category: Grimm (TV)
Genre: Family, Love, M/M, Sacrifice
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-11-30
Updated: 2015-12-13
Packaged: 2018-05-04 05:43:58
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 2,025
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5322674
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/shadowolfhunter/pseuds/shadowolfhunter
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sean Renard is scarcely an open book. But even then there are some secrets that no one knows, for a reason. Nick, Hank and Wu discover something about their captain, as everything goes to hell. Nick finds himself protecting a grieving man, a small child, and a very, very angry, very determined, devastated hexenbiest.</p><p>Will Nick's new life as a father help him to some realisations; and will Adalind and Meisner help him do something about all of it before it's all too late?</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. A Meeting

“Sean, I can’t do this anymore.”

Sean looks at her, she really does seem at the end of her rope. He can feel her, knows that she can feel him, and everything that’s happened to them over their lives just hurts so much. They’ve come so far, so many clandestine meetings over the years…

“We have to.” He says, shaking his head gently, the naked, unguarded love on his face would have been a surprise to so many who thought they knew him. “I can take almost anything, but losing you.”

“I felt you die.” Her voice cracks, the pain and despair scraping at him like claws, but he hardens his heart, this is for both of them.

He nods, accepting the truth of her fear and pain, “I know you did. I hate this, I wish it could be different.” His own voice is scratchy and he’s shivering as hard as she is.

He watches her make the supreme effort, feels her woge ripple near the surface before she forces it back down. “The Grimm?” There’s this light teasing note in her voice, he knows exactly what it cost for her to put it there, so he woges, steps forward and pulls her into his arms. Wraps himself around her, because who knows how long it will be before they see each other again and he needs this as much as she does.

So he closes his eyes, pulls her in and breathes, nods his answer.

“Trust you.” She says. “Only you could pick a path like this.”

He chokes a little, and grins at her answer.

She eases back, puts her hand up to his woged cheek, and they hold each other’s gaze, committing the little things to memory, for who knows how long it will be before they see each other again, and the world is going to hell… and neither wants to admit that this might be the last time.

[][][][][]

The hardest thing he has to do is walk away. He’s kept this secret by instinct even when he was a small child, he’s known pain, loss and sorrow for longer than anyone could ever begin to suspect. These days he wonders why he’s still doing it, keeping secrets… knowing this is one secret he will never reveal, most of the others are hardly really secrets.

He gets in his car, and drives. At first he hardly cares where, although he knows every single inch of these woods. They’ve been meeting here, randomly since he first landed in Portland, all those years ago. Then he starts to recognize landmarks, and realizes with a little embarrassment that this is the route he would take if he was going to see Nick.

Sometimes Sean Renard wonders if he’s lost the plot entirely. Him and Nick, well that’s a match made in equal parts of heaven and hell. They’re fine for five minutes, and then they’re not, and then they’re fine again and through this small bout of lust and antagonism, it could swing either way. At any given time.

It’s such a tender thing. So demonstrably unstable. And then there’s Adalind. And Diana, wherever she is, and Kelly… and none of this is likely or practical right now…

And dammit.

He scowls at the road in front of him, knowing that all the while he’s been arguing with himself, he’s instinctively steering for the Grimm.

 _You love him…_ Whispers through his mind, and he reaches out… 

_Enough of that, we both know it’s never going to be._


	2. Death and Wesen

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> An unpleasant discovery.

Sergeant Drew Wu has been a Portland Police Officer quite a while now. He’s seen a lot of things, this isn’t even the worst body dump he’s seen, but the moment he sees her face, he knows that this is going to be devastating.

He hopes that Nick has his head out of his ass because they are going to need the Grimm, and hopes that he, Drew, has got it wrong, but somehow he knows he hasn’t.

This news is going to drive a knife into the heart of one who has barely healed from the last blow.

Her jacket is right next to the body, crumpled and stained, he can’t move it, but he needs to cover her face. Before someone sees, and speculates in the wrong place. The enormity of this task strains at his nerves.

[][][][][]

Sean is at home when the pain that rips through him brings him to his knees, the loss overwhelming. Then he’s fumbling for his car keys, a tiny proportion of his rational mind knows that he shouldn’t be driving, but he has to get there, and there’s no one else.

It never occurs to him that he doesn’t actually know where he’s going, operating on blind instinct.

He pulls himself together, barely, and leaves the house.

[][][][][]

Nick looks down at the body with blank incomprehension. So alarmingly like the Captain. Her hair is long and dark and wavy, falling almost to her waist. She’s tall, possibly only a couple of inches shorter than Renard. It’s her facial features that really throw him, the patrician roman nose, the jawline, softer, feminine, the lips, and the clincher… those green eyes, dulled and sightless in death… Nick takes a shaky breath as images overlay themselves in his mind.

Shooting the Captain with blanks to get Jack out of him. It might have been real, and Nick finally accepts what that means to him. What Sean Renard means to him. Although it might be too late. Everything that has been happening has lead to this point. Nick knows it’s not over.

There’s no ID, no purse, but Wu and Hank are both sure that the Captain will know who she is. Nick is certain too, but a little corner of his soul is hoping otherwise. 

His Grimm hearing picks up footsteps behind him, rapid at first, slowing, he feel the Captain’s presence.

Nick turns, looks up at his Captain.

Renard stands about three feet from the body, frozen, a look of such complete agony on his face that Nick’s sure the man is going to break apart in front of him.

“Sir…” Renard’s eyes flick up for a second, the green a distinctive match to the dead woman’s and Nick wonders in that split second if the Captain’s going to deny it.

“Her name is Niamh Marie Renard…” Sean's voice is rough, it’s difficult to get the words out. “She is my sister.” And turns away, because he cannot look upon her now. Not without breaking apart and his detectives need him to be who he is.

Pain is rolling off Sean Renard in waves, and Nick just wants to hold the man close and take some of that pain away. Whatever water has passed under the bridge between Royal and Grimm, the dead woman is Renard’s sister, though until this moment Nick had no idea that Sean Renard had a sister.

He’s wondering about that, when Sean looks back and says “Keep me informed.”

It all just falls into place for Nick. The mask that Sean Renard wears every day, the things he has done, in those three brief words, the mask slips away and Nick can see the man clearly for the first time.

The unbreakable Captain is not unbreakable.

[][][][][]

Sean Renard’s iron strength of will, composure and every ounce of Royal and Wesen blood that flows through his veins keep him moving. He has not lived and fought for survival this long. He cannot show weakness.

He doesn’t realize that every movement screams his pain to the watching Grimm.


	3. Torn

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Nick gets the short straw... Interviewing the Captain about his sister. It doesn't go to plan, but about how Nick expected it to go.

Nick is poised on the edge of his chair this is the most difficult five minutes of his life so far. Somehow he, and Hank and Wu have taken a giant step backward on this, has to go into the Captain’s office and talk to the Captain about the Captain’s murdered sister.

The sister that until two hours ago no one knew that the Captain possessed; so far all they have is a name and a date of birth, and there’s something hokey about that because Sean’s sister shares the exact same birth day as her brother, apparently three years apart.

Coincidence? Nick doesn’t think so. Which makes the next question so miserably, painfully, devastatingly awkward he feels slightly sick for even thinking it, and he knows he’s right.

[][][][][]

Sean sits at his desk, he’s closed the blinds, closed the door, sits slumped at his desk staring at the blotter in front of him without seeing it.

He goes meticulously through all the possible permutations of what’s happened in his mind. 

He wonders in his detachment how next of kin will be informed.

All the while there’s this gaping wound, and Sean had never believed it was possible to hurt this much and still be alive.

[][][][][]

Even though the blinds are drawn, and Nick is pretty sure that the Captain’s metaphorical shutters will be firmly up, and he hates to do this to the man, questions have to be asked.

Nick figures it will be a lot less painful than if he were to wait.

He knocks quietly on Renard’s door, waits a beat or two, then opens the door.

It is probably worse than he imagined it would be. Renard… Sean… is staring at the blotter on his desk. He’s hunched over, slumped in his seat, he’s still wearing his trenchcoat, unbuttoned, over his suit and Nick doubts he’s ever seen anyone look so shattered in his life.

Nick takes a chair instead of slumping against the side wall like he usually does. “Your sister?” He says softly, making it as gentle a question as he can.

Sean’s eyes move from the blotter to Nick’s face, and the young detective catches his breath, because the pain in those eyes seems to stab him in his very soul. But they’re unfocused, unseeing as Sean murmurs something under his breath.

“Ma sœur ... ma meilleure amie, ma jumelle ... mon ange” He seems unaware he’s speaking another language, scarcely more than a whisper as the words seem to catch in his throat.

Tears roll down Sean’s cheeks, and Nick moves then, round the desk to put a comforting hand on his Captain’s shoulder, Sean half-turns in his chair, and suddenly Nick doesn’t care what this might look like or how it might be interpreted, he wraps an arm gently around Sean’s shoulders, and Sean leans into Nick like it’s the most natural thing in the world.

It’s the silence, Nick thinks. Sean Renard cries in complete silence, like the child who has learned to lock his pain and fear away, not to invite more abuse.

When Nick could think of Sean Renard as almost the enemy, the Wesen Prince who was maybe an ally, maybe a threat, he could handle the hint of attraction that he had felt ever since he had laid eyes on the man, seven years ago.

This broken devastated Sean, arms wrapped around Nick’s waist, leaning into his detective, fans the flames of Nick’s attraction. Nick cannot imagine a more awkward or inappropriate time to feel this way or even think about acting on it.

Instinctively Nick puts a hand the back of Sean’s head, a soothing caress, as Sean tries to pull himself together.

Nick eases back from Sean a little, keeping his hand on the back of the Captain’s neck. He knows he has to get the answers, but one look at the agony on Sean’s face and he realizes he really needs to get the Captain out of there. The man cannot deal with questions and curiosity and the well-meaning comments of others. Not until he can get his own torn emotions back under control.

He’s never seen Sean Renard like this, and in a lot of ways hopes he never sees it again. Everything that has happened to the man over the last year, this has just broken him.

Nick takes over, guides Sean to his feet, and gets him started towards the garage and Nick’s car, they can deal with all of this when Sean has had a chance to pull himself back.


End file.
